Library Of Congress Subject Headings Research Articles

Knowledge Organization Systems and Provenance: Experiences and Challenges

ABSTRACTThis panel is situated at the intersections of Knowledge Organization Systems (KOS) and provenance research. In this panel, we will share experiences and challenges in documenting the changes of a KOS The panelists will provide real‐world examples drawn from their research and practice. These examples range from KOSs used in LIS, such as the Dewey Decimal Classifications, Homosaurus, and Library of Congress Subject Headings; to extended information science research fields, such as digital preservation metadata standards, biodiversity taxonomies, and ontologies. Currently, the models and practices for documenting changes in KOSs fall short in supporting even simple provenance queries like “who made the change?”“what are the reasons for the change?”or“when was the change made?” The panelists will collectively discuss examples of queries we have faced, as well as the implications for provenance for KOS research and practice.This panel is sponsored by Classification & Metadata Research Special Interest Group (SIG‐CMR).

An Experiment with the Use of ChatGPT for LCSH Subject Assignment on Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study delves into the potential use of large language models (LLMs) for generating Library of Congress subject headings. The authors employed ChatGPT to generate subject headings for electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs) based on their titles and abstracts. The results suggest that LLMs such as ChatGPT have the potential to reduce the cataloging time needed for assigning subject terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) for ETDs as well as to improve the discovery of this type of resource in academic libraries. Nonetheless, human catalogers remain essential for verifying and enhancing the validity, exhaustivity, and specificity of Library of Congress subject headings generated by LLMs.

Freedom Versus Standard in Article Keyword Generation: An Empirical Study

This study compares the overlap among author-furnished keywords, Library of Congress Subject Headings and a consolidated controlled vocabulary for articles published in Annals of Library & Information Studies, published by NISCAIR from 2018 to 2023, India. The study focuses on the effectiveness of controlled vocabulary for keyword generation. The work is intended to contribute to the literature on author keywords versus keyword standardization in measuring information retrieval efficacy in real-time. The aggregated controlled vocabulary constructed for this study provided a positive result, showing the usefulness and requirements of such a robust controlled vocabulary. The study reflects the extended views of thesauri for a standard author keyword suggester or recommender system.

Discovery without Disclosure: Using Subject Metadata to Surface Implicit Content While Respecting Protected Identities

ABSTRACT Search for library resources may increasingly leverage linked data ontologies, in contrast to machine-readable cataloging (MARC) fields. Concerns about privacy and reductionism have emerged regarding protected identities like sexuality in linked data ontologies such as Wikidata. This study provides a Structured Query Language (SQL) methodology for search related to protected identities in MARC subject metadata; it distinguishes between linked data ontologies for search and taxonomies such as Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) embedded in MARC fields. Metadata may remain preferable to linked data entities to surface implicit content while respecting the privacy and varied experience of persons with protected identities.

<i>Cultus, Cult, and Cults</i>

Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) contains 244 subject headings that use the term “Cult” somewhere in the record. Many of the uses of “Cult” in LCSH are inaccurate, offensive, and outdated. This article is an analysis of the problem and a proposal for how to begin addressing the issues with “Cult” in LCSH.

Representing Historically Marginalized Communities in Archives: Moving Beyond LCSH to Create More Inclusive Subject Headings

The Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) are widely used around the world in libraries and archives to add access points for users searching their collections. This can be problematic because LCSH has many embedded issues including inconsistency and complexity, the myth of neutrality that surrounds it, systemic biases, and how slow it is to change. These problems lead to poor descriptions of people, especially those who belong to historically marginalized communities. Archives can move beyond LCSH to create local thesauri, crowdsourced vocabularies, and collaborative partnerships with historically marginalized communities to create more inclusive subject headings.

Domain Analysis Versus Facet Analysis

This paper delves into the complexities and theoretical underpinnings of knowl­edge organization systems (KOS), focusing on domain analysis and facet analysis as methodologies, such as improving the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH). The study repeats a former critique of the LCSH and argues for the incorporation of facet and domain analysis to enhance its utility and academic rigor. Facet analysis, although well-established, is critiqued for its rationalist philosophy and lack of empirical grounding. Domain analysis is presented as a complementary approach that addresses these gaps by considering empirical, historical, philosophical, and pragmatic issues. To any given system, the paper emphasizes that KO systems are not neutral; they reflect underlying theoretical paradigms that must be understood for effective classification. The study concludes by advocating for interdisciplinary research and broader cooperation among knowl­edge organization professionals, philosophers, and subject specialists to develop more robust and academically rigorous KOS.

“Our Metadata, Ourselves”: The Trans Metadata Collective

ABSTRACTThis paper presents the history, internal processes, and finalized report of the Trans Metadata Collective (TMDC), founded to address the lack of attention paid to trans and gender diverse issues in galleries, archives, libraries, museums, and special collections (GLAMS). The TMDC, an ad‐hoc group of nearly a hundred information professionals, developed best practices for the description and classification of trans and gender diverse information resources. These guidelines prioritize transparency, cultural sensitivity, correct identification, explicit descriptions of transphobia, and regular assessment of trans‐related content. It examines the effects of commonly used standards and controlled vocabularies such as Resource Description and Access (RDA) and Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) on trans and gender diverse people and critiques the inadequacy of these standards' representation of those communities. The TMDC provides guidance for using existing LCSHs, recommends alternative subject vocabularies, and proposes revisions to improve representation. The paper advocates individual agency in naming and gender identification, with recommendations on contacting creators and documenting their preferences. The TMDC emphasizes the importance of minimizing potential harm and protecting privacy in metadata creation. Overall, the report aims to enhance the representation and inclusion of trans and gender diverse communities in GLAMS institutions.

LCSH and Environmental Science

The environmental sciences are characterized by their boundless interdisciplinarity and cannot be discussed independently from other scientific fields such as ecology, engineering, and climatology. The complex nature of the discipline leads to challenges in placing it within a controlled vocabulary such as the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH). However, the placement of a term within a thesaurus hierarchy has potential repercussions for the discoverability of materials assigned that subject heading. As the environmental sciences are rapidly expanding due to global climate change, accurate representation of this discipline within a widely used vocabulary is crucial. In this paper we employ a visual mind mapping technique to examine how the environmental sciences are represented by codified language within the LCSH, then complete a domain analysis of the field to determine how environmental science represents itself. In comparing these two analyses we determine that the LCSH subject headings do not capture the interdisciplinary nature of the field in two primary ways; the term Environmental sciences is not sufficiently connected to the terms representing other major scientific subjects essential for a foundational understanding of environmental science, and key forward-looking topics of concern to environmental scientists such as Climatology are not in direct relationships with Environmental sciences. Correcting these issues is an important task, as ensuring that researchers are able to access a full range of environmental science materials will aid in finding sustainable climate solutions for our planet.

Improving Subject Description of an LGBTQ + Collection

This article summarizes the work done as part of a project to improve subject description of an LGBTQ + collection in the ONE Archives, part of the University of Southern California (USC) Libraries. The project involved adding local subject headings to augment existing Library of Congress Subject Headings. The article describes the steps that the project team took, along with the methods that were rejected. The paper discusses reasons why the team chose their course of action.

Unsettling the Library Catalog: A Case Study in Reducing the Presence of “Indians of North America” and Similar Subject Headings

As the University of Denver (DU) has begun to accept and wrestle with its history, the DU Libraries have looked for ways it may be perpetuating the harms done to Indigenous populations. An example of this work can be seen in the libraries’ work on changing the displayed terminology used in the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) to more current and appropriate headings that respect and correspond to the terminology used by the populations they are meant to represent. This article provides background for this work through a literature review and a more detailed account of how this topic is directly related to the institutional history of DU. A discussion of the specific steps and procedures taken to implement this change is followed by the obstacles encountered along the way and how they were overcome.

The coverage of information science and knowledge organization in the Library of Congress Subject Headings

PurposeThis article examines the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), which is the most used subject heading system in the world and an instance of a controlled vocabulary (CV).Design/methodology/approachThe method used to examine the system is based on both authors’ subject knowledge in the field of information science (IS) and the subfield of knowledge organization (KO). Core concepts in this domain were examined (1) by checking if they are present or not in the system; (2) if not, by determining whether LCSH contains alternative terms useful for searching documents about the missing concept, by examining books indexed by the Library of Congress; (3) by identifying the semantic relations between subject headings.FindingsThe results demonstrate fundamental problems in the logical consistency of the representation of IS and KO in LCSH.Practical implicationsThe implications for CVs in general are discussed.Originality/valueNo previous study has used our method to examine LCSH’s coverage of IS.

Implementation and Maintenance of FAST as Linked Data in a Digital Collections Platform at University of Victoria Libraries

University of Victoria Libraries has implemented faceted vocabularies, particularly FAST, in its digital collections platform (Vault). The process involved migrating a variety of standardized (pre-coordinated Library of Congress subject headings) and non-standardized metadata to conform to a URI-centric metadata application profile. The authors argue that faceted vocabularies and FAST have helped to create a robust and intuitive user navigation in the platform and allowed for an efficient and straightforward metadata creation process. Maintaining FAST as linked data within Vault has required putting in place some technical processes to keep URIs and textual labels up to date and solutions (FAST Updater) have been locally developed.

Acute temperature stresses trigger liver transcriptome and microbial community remodeling in largemouth bass (Micropterus salmoides)

The largemouth bass is an important freshwater fish in China. As global climate changes, mass mortality in largemouth bass due to extremely low/high temperatures has aroused growing concern. In the present study, we investigated the physiological responses of the liver and intestine in largemouth bass to acute low/high-temperature stresses. Acute low/high-temperature stresses caused histological alterations such as structural damage in the liver. Based on liver transcriptomic data, a total of 6678 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were detected, of which 2106, 5235, 3 and 449 DEGs were identified in fish treated with temperatures of 9 °C (serve cold-stress group, SC group), 18 °C (light cold-stress group, LC group), 30 °C (light heat-stress group, LH group), and 33 °C (serve heat-stress group, SH group), respectively. Further functional analysis found that the apoptosis, amino acid metabolism and lipid metabolism related signaling pathways were significantly enriched in fish after low-temperature stress, and protein processing in endoplasmic reticulum were significantly associated with heat stress. The weighted gene co-expression network analysis (WGCNA) results showed that multiple modules were significantly correlated with the LC or SC or SH groups, in which key signaling pathways were identified. Meanwhile, sequencing of the bacterial 16S rDNA gene demonstrated that acute high temperature stress reshaped the composition of the microbial community. Correlation analysis between bacteria and DEGs showed that bacteria could regulate pathways to affect the healthy status of host. This study provides the first systematic analysis about the adaptative responses of largemouth bass under acute temperature stresses by unveiling microbial, transcriptional, and histological changes, and identify microbial biomarkers/genes to monitor the health status of largemouth bass and to improve fish temperature tolerance, which will lay the foundation for further studies on the environmental stress response in largemouth bass.

Indigenous languages in the British Library catalogue: a critique of ‘Indians of North America—Languages’

The British Library holds a significant collection of printed materials in, and about, North American Indigenous languages that largely speaks to a history of colonial and settler-colonial projects and collecting. This article suggests one way of exploring what that collecting context means for how we find, experience and encounter language texts in the library. It offers an approach to ‘reading’ catalogues that puts texts in conversation with cataloguing systems to both contextualise and challenge the legacies of collecting in knowledge organisation today. It traces a brief history of the Library of Congress Subject Heading (LCSH), ‘Indians of North America—Languages’, a term that reoccurs in the British Library's catalogue. This history shows how parts of the catalogue are artefacts of problematic bodies of knowledge, whilst also surfacing examples of Indigenous resistance that can be used to reframe the catalogue.

Automated Knowledge Organization AI ML based Subject Indexing System for Libraries

The research study as reported here is an attempt to explore the possibilities of an AI/ML-based semi-automated indexing system in a library setup to handle large volumes of documents. It uses the Python virtual environment to install and configure an open source AI environment (named Annif) to feed the LOD (Linked Open Data) dataset of Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) as a standard KOS (Knowledge Organization System). The framework deployed the Turtle format of LCSH after cleaning the file with Skosify, applied TF-IDF as a language model (backend algorithm), and selected Snowball as an analyzer. The training of Annif was conducted with a large set of bibliographic records populated with subject descriptors (MARC tag 650$a) and indexed by trained LIS professionals. The training dataset is first treated with MarcEdit to export it in a format suitable for OpenRefine, and then in OpenRefine it undergoes many steps to produce a bibliographic record set suitable to train Annif. The framework, after training, has been tested with a bibliographic dataset to measure indexing efficiencies, and finally, the automated indexing framework is integrated with a data wrangling software (OpenRefine) to produce suggested headings on a mass scale. The entire framework is based on open source software, open datasets, and open standards.

Library of Congress Subject Headings: A Post-Coordinated Future

This paper is the result of a request from Library of Congress leadership to assess pre-coordinated versus post-coordinated subject cataloging. It argues that the disadvantages of pre-coordinated subject strings are perennial and continue to hinder progress, while the advantages of post-coordinated subject cataloging have expanded, resulting in new opportunities to serve the needs of catalogers and end users alike. The consequences of retaining pre-coordinated headings will have long-term impacts that heavily out-weigh the short-term challenges of transitioning to new cataloging practices. By implementing post-coordinated, faceted vocabularies, the Library of Congress will be investing in the future of libraries.

Using the Homosaurus in a Public Library Consortium: A Case Study

Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH) on LGBTQIA+ topics have not evolved alongside the frequently changing vernacular vocabulary used to access resources on the topics. To rectify this issue, libraries can choose to use an alternative controlled vocabulary, like The Homosaurus: An International LGBTQ+ Linked Data Vocabulary. This case study provides an overview of how Cooperative Computer Services (CCS), a public library consortium in Illinois, made the case to allow the Homosaurus in the CCS catalog, gained approval from the member libraries, and crafted a cataloging manual section. Other libraries can follow the recommendations in this article on how to properly make the case for the approval of a policy to allow an alternative controlled vocabulary in their catalog.

Handicapped has been cancelled: The terminology and logics of disability in cultural heritage institutions

This paper originated from a collaborative effort between an academic and archivist and a cataloger to address the issues around the LCSH heading “Social disabilities.” In it, we examine various aspects and consequences resulting from the ways that galleries, libraries, archives, museums, and special collections (GLAMS) organize knowledge about disability and disabled users. We do this primarily through the lens of documentary analysis of cataloging and classification systems as this process, elsewhere called “the power to name” (Olson, 2002), as it is the basis for the operation of GLAMS. First, we will provide an outline and contextual information about the Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH), the largest and most influential subject heading vocabulary system in the world. Next, we will examine the discourse around disability in library and information science via the results of a literature review. Next, we will examine the history, transformations, use, and meaning behind the LCSH heading “Social disabilities,” as an example of breakdown in terminology. Finally, and unique to the literature, we will propose an alternative hierarchy of terms for the Persons hierarchy in LCSH and discuss other methods that catalogers may use for organizing holdings about disability.

An Analysis of BERT (NLP) for Assisted Subject Indexing for Project Gutenberg

In light of AI (Artificial Intelligence) and NLP (Natural language processing) technologies, this article examines the feasibility of using AI/NLP models to enhance the subject indexing of digital resources. While BERT (Bidirectional Encoder Representations from Transformers) models are widely used in scholarly communities, the authors assess whether BERT models can be used in machine-assisted indexing in the Project Gutenberg collection, through suggesting Library of Congress subject headings filtered by certain Library of Congress Classification subclass labels. The findings of this study are informative for further research on BERT models to assist with automatic subject indexing for digital library collections.